Determining Your Professional Niche: My Life on “the Farm”
Donna M. Bouley DVM, PhD, DACVP
Department of Comparative Medicine, Stanford School of Medicine, Stanford, CA
(dbouley@stanford.edu)
In the spring of 1997, I was recruited as a “collaborator”, to join the newly-formed Department of
Comparative Medicine in the School of Medicine at Stanford University. My job title was “Medical
Center Line” (MCL) Assistant Professor, and I was to provide pathology support to Stanford’s clinical
and basic scientists working with animal models of human disease. For the past 18 yrs I have felt blessed
every single day that I accepted that offer, and since I stepped foot on “the Farm” – (the nickname for this
gorgeous 8000 acre campus, 35 miles south of San Francisco), I have never had any regrets.
My journey to full Professor at Stanford was facilitated by the breadth of opportunities anatomic
pathology training can provide. But before I discuss my role at Stanford, let me briefly supply the
highlights of my background and the academic and personal influences and choices that ultimately landed
me in “the perfect job”. I’ll try to be brief…
I was a late-comer to the profession of veterinary medicine, having worked during and after college for 7
years as a competitive gymnastics coach and judge. I was, however, very into horses all my youth and in
college at University of Massachusetts, Amherst, so I chose to major in Animal Science with an
individual concentration in “horses and horsemanship” (which certainly helped when I finally decided to
become a vet). I grew up in Massachusetts, but moved to Tennessee for personal and professional reasons
a few years after college. Once I decided I wanted to be a vet, I applied to and was accepted to the
University of Tennessee, Knoxville, College of Veterinary Medicine (UTCVM), with the intent of
becoming a mixed animal practitioner. Upon vet school graduation, I promptly returned full time into
coaching and judging, (which had supplemented my loans during vet school). While attempting part time
vet work for three years, I finally realized I was NOT cut out for clinical practice! While visiting UTCVM
for a CE workshop in equine basic surgical techniques (of all things…), I happened to visit with the
pathologists and was invited to apply for their 5 year combined anatomic pathology residency/PhD
program, interviewed a week later and was offered the position. I really had no idea what I was getting in
to; it was very different back then, no vet student pathology clubs, etc. so I was very inexperienced in all
aspects of vet pathology other than the 4 weeks of necropsy rotation I had during vet school. I also had
never done ANY research!
Many and varied events during those 5 years in my residency led me to where I am today; an encouraging
group of fellow residents (the late Bob Duncan, Isle Silva- Krott, Bob Donnell, David Dean, Gary Mason,
Carrie Brennaman, and Katharine Whitney), wonderful pathology faculty (Drs. Steve Patton, Mal
McCracken, Mike Breider, J. Erby Wilkinson, and of course Don McGavin), an understanding and
supportive department chair, Dr. Dave Slauson, informal mentorship from the late, great Linda Munson,
and the opportunity to work with a fantastic scientist, my PI Barry Rouse DVM, PhD. Barry supported
me an extra 2 years (beyond the 5 yr. combined program) by making me write an NSF grant. He
challenged me every day, taught me how to think, and ultimately was a tremendous advocate for me and
my career. His lab worked with mouse models of herpetic stromal keratitis, the form of HSV-1 infection
that leads to a leading cause of blindness in developed countries. Working for him, I not only learned
quality cellular immunology but also got to work with some of the “cutting edge tools” (at the time) such
as FACs, IHC, and transgenic and knock-out mice. The ocular pathology that I performed as part of my
PhD research made me realize the value of pathology in an experimental setting.
When I finished my PhD in 1995 (10 years after graduating from vet school), I had two very different job
offers; 1) as a research associate at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Research Center that Dr. Rouse helped
facilitate, and 2) as a clinical instructor in anatomic pathology at Texas A & M. Although I enjoyed
research, I knew I didn’t want to run a lab and spend my career writing grants. Sitting for pathology
boards was my priority, so I took the job at A & M. Wise decision! I was able to submerge myself once
again into anatomic pathology, sat for and passed boards in 1996, and started looking for a position where
I could ideally work as collaborator. Dr. Linda Cork, then the chair of Comparative Medicine at Stanford
School of Medicine, called me and said she was looking for a pathologist who could serve as an
“ambassador” between the department and investigators throughout the medical school. Whatever
potential she sensed in me, I am grateful she gave me a chance and invited me to visit Stanford. The rest
is history…
So what does a veterinary pathologist in a medical school and an ambassador have in common? A lot!! I
have certainly felt at times that I was in a “foreign country”, much like an ambassador might be. First of
all, experimental pathology can seem very “foreign” relative to the preparation a trainee receives in a
traditional companion anatomic pathology residency (eg species-wise, lesions due to combinations of
treatments, new pathologies seen in mutant/genetically engineered mice, and constant crossover between
disciplines like toxicology, radiology and imaging, stem cell biology, etc.). But aside from the job feeling
a bit foreign, the environment did as well. Many of the MDs and basic science researchers at the medical
school lacked an appreciation for similarities between human and veterinary medicine. A few of the
collaborators with whom I worked with were unaware that veterinary school required an additional 4 yrs
AFTER college, or that veterinarians could become specialized through residency training, or would
bother to do research or obtain PhDs. Despite the fact that my training was inherently “comparative” and I
was used to extrapolating knowledge between species, proving my worth took time and patience.
Furthermore, I found my approach was at times more important than my academic ability.
So my advice to veterinary pathologists considering a similar role would be as follows:
1) Be a generalist. My own PhD research involved viral-induced immune mediated ocular disease in
mouse models. Once at Stanford, however, I enthusiastically built up my resume through collaborations
across numerous disciplines in a variety of species, including (but not limited to): bacterial pathogen/host
interactions, phenotypic characterization of transgenic and knock-out mice, xenograph and orthotopic
cancer models, drug and nanoparticle “toxicity” studies, developmental biology models, medical device
development in large animal models (dog and swine), and frog TB models. And the list goes on. If you
are easily bored, being a collaborator is the way to go!
2) Be resourceful. Pathology support isn’t all we can provide. I drew equally upon my research training. I
often found that my experience with experimental design in using animal models was equally as valuable
to the lab groups as were my pathology interpretations (eg. always use the proper controls…).
3) Be respectful. The expertise that the investigators have for the specific organ systems or diseases they
research would often extend far beyond mine in terms of the molecular, cellular and functional intricacies
of their particular organ system. However, they often didn’t know anything about the rest of the animal.
Therefore I was constantly providing education of anatomical and/ histological differences between
humans and the various animal models in use, and would always try to emphasize the “big picture” that
their results revealed to me.
4) Be adaptable. I was often forced to work around the limitations that research funding (or lack thereof)
can impose on researchers. Because of the financial workings of our Research Animal Facility, traditional
“collaborations” (ie, providing pathology support merely in exchange for co-authorship) was not an
option; researchers were required to either put me on their grants for salary support (depending on the
level of involvement, support would range from 2 – 15% effort), or strictly pay fee for service.
Unfortunately, with extremely high animal housing costs at Stanford and other expenses involved in
supporting large numbers of personal and cutting edge translational research etc, animal model pathology
support was often low on their priority lists. Therefore, as a way to gain credibility and build trust, I
would often train lab members to perform basic dissections and proper necropsies, to identify gross
pathologies, and to trim tissues for histology, instead of doing these tasks myself. I found this approach
to be the best way to make the researchers more open to my involvement, and it gave them a greater
appreciation for the benefits a veterinary pathologist could bring to their lab.
5) Know your limitations; just don’t underestimate what you CAN do. As a collaborator, it is
impossible to be an expert in everything, or to master ALL pathology tools, particularly at a place like
Stanford where so many biomedical tools are developed. Despite the fact that graduate students and post
docs in many labs are extremely well versed in 3D confocal microscopy, multi-color IHC, microarrays, in
situ hybridization, etc. they often can’t look at a routine H&E slide and identify a red blood cell!
Therefore, I would just push what was second nature to me - strong basics - and would encourage the labs
to always use good old fashion H&E, quality morphology, basic special stains like trichrome, Prussian
blue, gram stains etc. This was some of the most valuable pathology support I could provide across all
species and experimental disciplines.
6) Be supportive yet skeptical. Don’t let the PI taint your interpretation just because they want a positive
result. Negative data has value too! In particular, knowing background lesions typical in certain strains of
mice is essential to not being duped into misinterpretation of findings.
7) Lose your “ego”. It was and is a privilege to work with so many talented, often famous clinical and
basic scientists at a place like Stanford. Regardless of the position in the authorship list in which my name
appeared, co-authorship on papers in high impact scientific journals is really what matters.
8) As a co-author, edit the entire paper. Although my work was often just a small portion of a
manuscript, I always carefully read and edited the entire manuscript. MDs and PhDs will often use only
the “human” terminology, but greatly appreciate when the correct veterinary/animal anatomical
terminology is provided. I would also comment when I didn’t understand something in a paper. If I felt
that some point the group was trying to make wasn’t clear to me, there was a good chance that outside
readers might also be confused.
And finally…
9) Teach!! Even though my primary role has been as clinical faculty in a medical school, I have had
opportunities (and taken them) to teach and mentor at all levels; undergraduates, graduate students and
post docs, pre-vets, pre-meds, pre-dental students, and future graduate students. The inherent “One
health” environment in a medical school provided me the ideal environment to share not only a love of
veterinary pathology but also to help the veterinary profession in general by ultimately exposing quality
young minds to careers in biomedical professions!